"Imperialism" and "The Tracks of Our Forefathers" eBook

As the well-to-do in Europe flung themselves into
revelry with the signing of the armistice, so did
they here. Four years of war had corked the bottle
of gayety. The young men were all overseas.
Life was a little too cloudy during that period to
be gay. Shadows hung over too many homes.
But that was past. They had pulled the cork and
thrown it away, one would think. Pleasure was
king, to be served with light abandon.

It was a fairly vigorous place, MacRae discovered.
He liked it, gave himself up to it gladly,—­for
a while. It involved no mental effort. These
people seldom spoke of money, or of work, or politics,
the high cost of living, international affairs.
If they did it was jocularly, sketchily, as matters
of no importance. Their talk ran upon dances,
clothes, motoring, sports indoors and afield, on food,—­and
sometimes genially on drink, since the dry wave had
not yet drained their cellars.

MacRae floated with this tide. But he was not
wholly carried away with it. He began to view
it impersonally, to wonder if it were the real thing,
if this was what inspired men to plot and scheme and
struggle laboriously for money, or if it were just
the froth on the surface of realities which he could
not quite grasp. He couldn’t say. There
was a dash and glitter about it that charmed him.
He could warm and thrill to the beauty of a Granada
ballroom, music that seduced a man’s feet, beauty
of silk and satin, of face and figure, of bright eyes
and gleaming jewels, a blending of all the primary
colors and every shade between, flashing over a polished
floor under high, carved ceilings.

He had surrendered Nelly Abbott to a claimant and
stood watching the swirl and glide of the dancers
in the Granada one night. His eyes were on the
brilliance a little below the raised area at one end
of the floor, and so was his mind, inquiringly, with
the curious concentration of which his mind was capable.
Presently he became aware of some one speaking to
him, tugging at his elbow.

“Oh, come out of it,” a voice said derisively.

He looked around at Stubby Abbott.

“Regular trance. I spoke to you twice.
In love?”

“Uh-uh. Just thinking,” MacRae laughed.

“Deep thinking, I’ll say. Want to
go down to the billiard room and smoke?”

They descended to a subterranean chamber where, in
a pit lighted by low-hung shaded globes, men in shirt
sleeves clicked the red and white balls on a score
of tables. Rows of leather-upholstered chairs
gave comfort to spectators. They commandeered
seats and lighted cigarettes. “Look,”
Stubby said. “There’s Norman Gower.”

Young Gower sat across a corner from them. He
was in evening clothes. He slumped in his chair.
His hands were limp along the chair arms. He was
not watching the billiard players. He was staring
straight across the room with the sightless look of
one whose mind is far away.